The Watchmen

2

The protective suits had been developed from those designed by NASA for space and moon walks, completely isolating and insulating the wearer from all outside environment. There was internal temperature control, with oxygen provided by built-in backpacks. The head domes had a dual relay voice system, for every conversation between them to be simultaneously recorded and monitored.

Schnecker ordered his three-man team to suit up very soon after the helicopter’s liftoff from Andrews, predominantly to acclimatize Cowley. Schnecker took the FBI man through the operating procedure, repeatedly insisting that the protection was total, providing the suit skin was not punctured.

“And from the look of it there’s a lot of sharp-edged crap to avoid,” warned the bearded scientist, indicating the uneven, sometimes broken pictures from the abandoned bomb squad television camera that were being patched into the helicopter during the flight. “How’s it feel?”

Cowley was a big man, six foot two and with neglected college football muscle taking him just over 200 pounds. He shrugged the suit around him, tensing his shoulders, and said, “OK, I guess.”

Schnecker said, “Make sure you see where you’re going before you move. And when you do, do it slowly.”

Neil Hamish, the team’s ballistic expert, looked up from the manual he had been comparing with the TV pictures and said, “Nothing like it here. Looks like a double delivery. Binary principle, maybe.” He looked sideways at Cowley and in a molasses-thick Tennessee accent said, “You make out the writing on the side?”

“The word’s definitely poison. And agent,” replied Cowley.

“Like to know what I’m asking the meters to detect,” complained the third scientist, Richard Pointdexter. He had two devices with calibrated dials tethered by individual straps to his wrist.

“Me, too,” said the fourth man, Hank Burgess, attaching a matching detector to his arm.

“All we can do is play the field for the obvious,” judged Schnecker.

“Jesus George Christ!”

The pilot’s voice brought them away from their protective preparations and the picture-split television monitor. New York was on the absolute horizon. Between them and the faraway view was a surreal, tidal-wave imagery of vehicles of every type and description surging along every road and highway but all in the same direction, away from the jagged-toothed Manhattan skyline. In too many places to count, as they flew over and against the one-way movement, there were jams and bulged blocks of collided cars and trucks, the obstructions swollen by the frantic but failed efforts of following drivers to detour through adjoining fields and properties.

Hamish said, “Like Orson Welles and War of the Worlds all over again.”

Schnecker asked, “What’s the current wind direction?”

The pilot said, “Southeast, tending northerly. Slow.”

Schnecker said, “None of them down there are in the slightest danger. If it’s been released, it’s going over Brooklyn.”

“What about Brooklyn?” Cowley asked.

“Until we identify what it is, we won’t know how containable it is,” the leader of the microbiological team replied.

“The only man in the bomb disposal team to be showing any respiratory affect is asthmatic,” Burgess, a qualified doctor, reminded them. “They were in the proximity of the warhead for precisely three minutes and forty seconds; that’s long enough to have picked up something,”

“We don’t know the warhead: how it’s programmed to operate,” Hamish pointed out.

“Or who launched it,” said Cowley.

“Your problem, buddy, not ours,” said Schnecker.

“We get the easy part,” said Pointdexter.

“Will you look at that!” demanded the pilot, who had flown far to the west of New Jersey to skirt any airborne contamination, finally approaching Manhattan from the north, from upstate New York to keep the wind behind them.

Cowley decided he was perfectly dressed for the sterile moonscape that was his immediate impression of the city below them. There was movement-there were emergency units at the island side of the Triboro and the Brooklyn bridges and a swarm of media helicopters infesting the sky overhead-but the gridlocked streets below appeared as eerily deserted but as haphazardly traffic-blocked by panic-abandoned vehicles as any Hollywood depiction that Cowley had ever seen of a nuclear attack. And then as Cowley gazed down more intently-continuing the Hollywood script-he picked out more isolated pockets of people, presumably playing out the end of their world.

A group were dancing in what appeared to be a street party by Columbus Circle, and there was another partying gathering outside the Tavern on the Green in Central Park. Tables had been pulled out from a restaurant or cafe and set up in a gap of abandoned traffic on Broadway. Cowley counted twelve people sitting around bottles of looted wine, apparently determined to die drunk. One man was already lying full length and motionless in the gutter. As they passed overhead, two women looked up and waved. One inexplicably lifted her sweater to expose her braless breasts. Some still-burning movie and theater lights added to the party atmosphere. A lot more looting was visible as they finally turned to cross town, although most of the loot-from Macy’s in Times Square and along 42nd Street-seemed quickly to have been discarded outside the stores from which it had been stolen. One man was determinedly pushing a cart loaded with television sets and microwave ovens up Lexington Avenue, whirling his free hand in dismissal to the fluttering machines overhead.

Schnecker checked William Cowley’s suit and said, “Everything OK?”

Cowley nodded without replying, conscious of other helicopters coming in on them as their own slowly descended. He was surprised there was sufficient space to land directly in front of the UN complex.

Looking at the other camera-sprouting helicopters swarmed above them, Hamish said, “Here’s our fifteen minutes of fame.”

Schnecker said, “Let’s keep the conversation to its regulated essentials. Count-off time. Cowley?”

“Ready.”

“Hamish?”

“Ready.”

“Pointdexter?”

“OK.”

“Burgess?”

“Let’s see what we’ve got.”

Although also protectively suited, the pilot didn’t turn off the rotors, so they left the machine bent forward and in single file, Schnecker leading. Everyone except Cowley carried various pieces of equipment, some unseen in oddly shaped containers. Directly out of the downdraft they stopped, at Schnecker’s gesture. Pointdexter and Burgess stared down at the dials of the calibrated meters held in front of them, like temple offerings. Pointdexter said, formally, “The time is nine of ten. There is negative register at ground level.”

Burgess said, “I confirm.”

Cowley hadn’t expected to be able to move so easily. His sweat, he supposed, was nervousness, not a malfunction of the suit’s temperature control. He didn’t consciously feel nervous. Neil Hamish moved slightly to one side, operating their own shoulder-held television camera to track their every movement. Cowley acknowledged that their film, as well as their every verbal comment-like the earlier footage and remarks of the NYPD bomb disposal unit-was for corrective assessment if the five of them were overcome and died. He wished he could think of something profound to contribute; so far his only sound had been noisy breathing of his oxygen. He wondered if Pauline was watching a television relay from one of the overhead helicopters. The voices of the others were distorted, with a metallic echo, and he didn’t expect she’d recognize his if he spoke. He certainly wouldn’t be identifiable encompassed in his moon suit and didn’t expect the bureau to name him. They would, if he died.

They huddled around Pointdexter and Burgess directly inside the Secretariat Tower vestibule. Maintaining formality, Pointdexter said, “Nine-fifteen. Still negative register.”

“Confirm,” said Burgess, bent over his meter.

“Let’s take our time,” coaxed Schnecker. “Repeat the full check.”

Both monitoring scientists did so without protest. Pointdexter said, “I repeat, nothing.”

There was a moment of uncertainty before Schnecker said, “Electricity’s still on, so let’s use the elevators,” and then at once raised a warning hand. “Too many for one car in these suits and with all this equipment. Me, Hamish, and Pointdexter in one, Burgess and Cowley in the other.”

Cowley didn’t feel himself sweating anymore. Hamish filmed their exit from the second elevator. The first three men weren’t waiting as a courtesy gesture, Cowley guessed; procedure probably required confirmation of no chemical or biological agent from Burgess’s meter, which the man gave at once.

Schnecker said, “I’m beginning to think everyone’s been lucky.”

“I don’t know the type of warhead,” reminded the ballistics expert. “Maybe what’s inside it is new to us, too.”

They didn’t need the floor plan, which was Cowley’s FBI contribution. Through a gaping hole that spread from a distorted window frame, the East River was clearly visible to their right, where the corridor that bands the skyscraper at every level curled away. The wrecked offices were ripped open for examination on their left. Two internal walls were collapsed, their remains barely supporting the falling-in ceiling, which looked to have burst an outside wall. An internal door was bowed but unbroken by the pressure of debris from above. Another door had disappeared, leaving only its buckled frame. The wind, which hadn’t seemed strong at ground level, whined through the gaps in the outer wall, constantly swirling papers and documents, many of which were slowly leaking out to drift over the river. All five men jumped at the sound of a telephone from one of the open-doored offices behind them.

Burgess said, “Damned double-glazing salesman!” and Hamish laughed.

Schnecker said, “Let’s pass on the comedy,” and led the way forward until they reached the fourth office. The door had crumpled inwards and faced them with jagged splinters, like a medieval animal or man trap. None of the intervening walls remained, and a domino fall of cabinets, all their drawers burst open, seemed to mark the passage of the disjointed missile that lay in front of the hurriedly discarded police camera. To their right there was virtually cleared space to the gaping hole through which the rocket had entered.

The five bodies were in the farthest office, although that of one of the cleaners wasn’t to be discovered beneath the collapsed roof for another week. The rocket had totally decapitated the two clerks. The body of the other cleaner appeared to have suffered no visible injury. Neither had that of the fourth clerk, who still remained upright on a chair.

“Poor bastards,” said Hamish. “It would have been instantaneous, though.”

Cowley realized that, incredibly, the missile had entered perfectly through an actual window, the glass of which would have presented no obstacle and probably accounted for the warhead remaining intact. All the other damage would have been caused by the peripheral shock waves. He said so and Schnecker agreed. Cowley was glad an astutely intelligent observation would go on record. He was at once embarrassed at the reflection in the close proximity of the dead people.

There were creaks of further settling masonry and a slight fall of dust and grit from what had once been an adjoining office. Schnecker said, “Don’t touch anything that might be a support. It wouldn’t take much to bring the roof in on us.”

Hamish edged in first with his camera, keeping as far away as possible from the needle points of the shattered door. He turned off the police camera and said, “It is a first. Nothing like it in any of our manuals. Double-aligned canister warhead, estimated meter in length, estimated fifteen millimeters in circumference-”

“Damaged,” Schnecker broke in. “Indentation to the left nose cone. We’ll test before moving them. We can record the specifics from the pictures.”

Burgess and Pointdexter stooped side by side, clicking their meter controls through test sequences. It was Pointdexter who said, “At nine thirty-two the warhead appears to be intact, with no evidence of leaking.”

“Affirmative,” confirmed Burgess.

Slowly, spacing the words, Schnecker said, “I am now going to move the warhead for the lettering to be deciphered. From the visual appearance, it looks as if it has snapped from the mountings of its delivery system, the fins and body of which are badly crushed and distorted. Hank …?”

“Providing it is structurally safe to do so, I intend examining what could be the entry trajectory,” took up Burgess. “I agree from what external examination is possible that at the soft point of impact, through the window, the device spun into reverse and that the inert delivery section of the missile and residual shock caused the damage.”

“Which had the effect of shielding the nose cones and preventing the warhead from exploding to release whatever the contents are,” completed Schnecker. “Ready with the detectors?”

“Affirmative,” replied Pointdexter and Burgess in unison. They set their meters side by side, against the nearest canister edge.

From a bag he shrugged from his shoulder, Schnecker took matching, rubber-encased long-nosed pliers the mouths of which were adjustable by a shaft-mounted control knob to fit the diameter of an object. The team leader connected each grip individually to the top and bottom of the warhead, locking the jaws in place. He said, “Ten-oh-five. I am starting to lift. There appears to be no triggering attachment linking the warhead to its delivery rocket … no resistance from anything not externally visible … no register on any of the three detectors …. I am now turning the head, for the lettering to be visible …”

“Gorki,” read Cowley, at once. “Plant 35. Numerals in spaced groups: 19 gap 38 gap 22 gap 22 gap zero. And sarin. The word is sarin, on the head nearest to me. Then comes the words poison, highly toxic. And an emergency telephone number: 8765323. The date is January 1974.” He strained, as Schnecker slowly rotated the warhead now totally removed from its pod. “It says Gorki on the second arm. Plant 35. Different numeral markings: 20 gap 49 gap 88 gap zero gap six … and anthrax. The word is anthrax. The same date as on the first. And the same poison and toxicity warning. The same emergency telephone number. Definitely sarin on one, anthrax on the other.”

In front of him, Pointdexter and Burgess finally calibrated their detectors to the chemical and biological agents. Pointdexter said, “There is no leak.”

“Affirmative,” said Burgess.

For the benefit of the relayed recording, Schnecker said, “We have recovered intact a dual-headed missile of a design unrecognizable to us. Manufacturing designation is Gorki, Russia, Plant 35. With the missile separated from its delivery rocket, it is possible to see at the base to which the head was originally fixed what appears to have been intended puncturing detonator pins.” The team leader moved slightly for Hamish to bring his camera in closer. “Both are bent, one snapped completely off and lying on the floor below … I am now removing the warhead, separate from its delivery mechanism, from where it might be crushed by the further collapse of ceiling or room debris …. Technician Burgess will independently remove the delivery system.”

Hamish said, “We don’t have a neutralizing container it’ll fit.”

“We’ll have to take it as it is-” began Schnecker, jerking to a stop at a rasping, tearing noise and then a burst of dust from the most badly damaged, river-fronting office as more ceiling fell in. “All out, slowly,” he started again. “You really need that trajectory trace, Neil?”

“I’ll be careful,” the ballistics expert replied.

Everyone except Hamish walked back to the safety of the area immediately outside the elevator bank. Once there, Schnecker and Pointdexter transferred the warhead to a rubber-meshed carrying sling.

Schnecker said, “I’d like to get this back and safely locked away without any Washington detours.”

“There’ll be a lot for me to do here in New York, so I’ll stay,” said Cowley. Where should I begin? he wondered.

Everyone turned at Hamish’s exit from the shattered offices farther along the corridor. At the empty door of the room in which the bodies lay, the man briefly crossed himself before coming toward them, patting the camera in satisfaction.

To the FBI division chief Schnecker said, “We’ll have to stay suited up all the way back to Fort Meade, just in case this starts to leak, so you’ll be safer here in New York anyway.”

“How’s that?” demanded Cowley.

It was Burgess who reached out, touching the tear in the left sleeve of Cowley’s protective suit. Burgess said, “We probably could have saved you if only one had detonated, knowing what we were dealing with. But you’d have felt like hell for a very long time. Not so sure how you’d have been if both had gone off, like they were obviously intended to.”

Furnishing his Ulitza Petrovka office with the latest available flatscreen television was one of several indulgences Dimitri Ivanovich Danilov allowed himself after his confirmation as operational director of Moscow’s Organized Crime Bureau. Another was ensuring it received American CNN newscasts, which enabled him to watch live the unfolding events in New York. He’d wondered if Cowley had been the unnamed FBI official to whom the helicopter-borne reporters had referred, long before the familiar, overpowering figure, space suit discarded over his arm, walked from the UN tower slightly behind the rest of the group still in protective clothing. With Cowley was a slightly built, immaculately dressed Mediterranean featured man whom the CNN reporter immediately identified as the UN secretary-general. The cameraman held the shot as Cowley tossed his suit and helmet into the helicopter before retreating under the entrance canopy with the diplomat.

Danilov watched the running newscast for another hour before the summons came from the Interior Ministry. By then the death toll from traffic accidents and stress-related causes-mostly asthma seizures and heart attacks-had been established at fifty-four. One victim was the asthmatic member of the original NYPD bomb disposal squad. The Russian source of the missile had also been confirmed.

For once there was no shuffled expansion to prevent his joining a crowded table, and Patrick Hollis slid gratefully into the sort of group from which he was normally excluded in the bank’s cafeteria. He let the discussion swirl around him, holding back from any opinion: Having gotten to the table, he didn’t want to be ridiculed.

“Madmen!” declared Robert Standing, one of the senior clerks in the mortgage department and Hollis’s chief tormentor. “Deserve the chair when they’re caught.”

“They’ll demand money,” anticipated Carole Parker, the blond counter clerk who was the latest focus of Hollis’s fantasies.

“That’s how they’ll get the bastards,” agreed Standing. “Set a trap with the money.”

It would have been wonderful to contradict the man: show Standing up for the boastful, know-nothing fool that he was, with his hand up every willing skirt. Just as it would have been wonderful to let everyone around the table-Carole most of all-know how he’d amassed the fortune of nearly $2,000,000 that no one knew-or could ever know-he had.